The Ten Types of Students During Exams

By Sarah Harris

With the impending dark cloud of exams following everybody around, it’s a familiar reality that those around you will be dealing with revision and coursework in their own unique way. Although, in this case, their own way tends to fall into one of the following ten categories.

The Ones You Never SeeThey stay in the library all day, revising for 15 hours at a time. When you do see them you feel uncomfortable because they ask you how your revision’s going with a smug smile on their happy face before admitting that they’re “kind of excited” for their exam tomorrow. Little do you know that they have mini breakdowns behind their desk and furiously google brain foods, hoping their kale with wild salmon will make them more intelligent overnight.

The Laid-Back OnesTotally different to ‘The Ones You Never See’, The Laid-Back Ones are always around. You see them in the kitchen, casually drinking enough coffee to keep them awake for a week, you see them on the sofa, laptop in one hand, revision notes in the other and the telly on full volume, you even see them in Tesco, buying a bottle of red wine to drink that night over a thick study book. They are often seen smiling or humming and are always game for a long chat, as long as it’s not about exams.

The Fitness FanaticsWho cares if they’re starting their New Year’s Resolution five months late? Summers fast approaching and no exams are going to get in the way of that beach bod. The fitness freaks who couldn’t even be bothered to walk down to the shop before, take procrastination to a whole new level. They’re out every day, in the rain and the cold, running miles along the beach front then heading to the gym to do the circuit and yoga classes that they’ve only just joined. They keep saying that exercise is the key to relax and to have a clear mind, but we all know that they just don’t want to revise. At least they can say that they’ve done something productive with their day.

The Ones Who Do Everything But ReviseSimilar to ‘The Fitness Fanatics’, they also procrastinate to the max, but think it’s completely acceptable because everything they do is highly “educational”. Whether it’s writing tens of articles for the university newspaper (mmhm), planning socials for their society, working at a local bar, volunteering at the soup kitchen, or visiting high school pupils as a course ambassador, these students know that even if their grades won’t be high, their CV will still look amazing.

The Ones Who Eat All DayThese are the ones you see spending half an hour in Tesco’s, going around very slowly, looking at everything and taking ages to decide what ten items to buy. They struggle to unlock their doors because they’re holding what looks like a fantastic picnic for five people in their hands; having not wanted to pay 5p for a bag of course. They can finally relax when they get to their seat and set their food around their computer like a work of art. They sit there all day, never not nibbling at something, because food, after all, is the only way they’ll get through revision.

The Not Feeling Well OnesThese students are so nervous that they think they’ve caught a vomiting bug, even though it’s all in their head because they’ve worked themselves up so badly. They feel ill just looking at a past exam paper so they go to the doctor’s anyway, just in case, knowing deep inside that nothing’s really wrong but still hoping to get a note for extenuating circumstances. Sometimes their housemates are even concerned that they’re trying to give themselves food poisoning when they cook their chicken in the microwave.

The WorriersThese students will be living in the library, looking up every single topic possible, just to make sure that they haven’t missed anything and that they will be sure to know every single answer in their exam. Whenever they are not near their books they will be muttering complicated sounding words to themselves and will have to suddenly rush to their room to check if they still know an answer to a question they had been trying to memorise. Sadly, they never sleep because they find it impossible to when their revision notes are stuck in their head and they can’t think of anything else, lest they forget something.

The Ones Who Need ReassuranceThese ones won’t leave you alone; always reading you their essay and asking for your opinion, they really get on your nerves but you know that they’re just scared and want someone to tell them that it’ll be alright, that their essay is good, even though it’s clear that you have no idea what it’s on about. These students also keep telling you exactly what they’re going to be revising that day and how they’re going to do it, just because hearing it out loud makes them feel more organised and motivated. What annoys you the most is how they say that everyone thinks their degree is easy but “it’s actually not, you know” and that they have so much work to do, “more than you”, but always come out with a first anyway.

The PessimistsThese students won’t stop complaining how they’re going to fail every single exam and every single piece of coursework. Some of them will carry on working while sighing and shaking their head, knowing nothing good will come out of it, others will have given up a long time ago and will have already looked at backpacking trips, opportunities to teach English in Japan, or applied for full time jobs at Sports Direct or Tesco.

The Ones Who Have No ExamsHalf of these students only have essays to do and think the best way to do them is to pull an all-nighter, at the last minute while sharing a tub of KFC chicken wings with a friend. The other half have no work at all to do and keep moaning about how they’d rather do exams than “die of boredom” and how it’s so rubbish at Sin with only the locals and Met students around. They have no idea how much everyone envies them.